Next generation wireless networks are moving to packet-based technology to facilitate communication of multimedia information. Although more robust in terms of the type of information carried by the network, the packet processing requirements may in some cases slow down system performance. This may be undesirable, particularly with respect to those applications having a high Quality of Service (QoS) requirement, such as voice communications. Consequently, there may be a need for improved techniques to process packets in a wireless network to communicate multimedia information.